Effie 2022 | Winners

​​To view the winners list click here.

After two years of virtual Effie Awards, the Commercial Communications Council was able to recognise and celebrate the most effective marketing campaigns in Aotearoa last night in person at the Civic Theatre. With a sold-out event, the crowd came in droves to celebrate this year’s achievements and to celebrate the last 20 years of effectiveness in Aotearoa.

This year’s convenor of judges, Lisa Divett, said “The Effie’s provide the perfect platform to recognise the power of creativity to solve problems, which for me is the true magic of advertising. This year we were delighted at the range of work entered despite all the difficulties of the last couple of years and last night provided a wonderful opportunity to get together and celebrate the brilliant tāngata who work across our industry – and wasn’t it ace“.

2022 saw some changes to the awards programmes with the addition of two new categories – Customer Experience and our Te Tohu Aumangea | Diversity, Equity & Inclusion category, along with new sponsors New Zealand Story and Stuff.

There were 42 awards handed out on the night, 17 Bronze, 15 Silver, 7 Gold, and 3 Executive Awards. Of the 7 Golds awarded on the night, two went to Lassoo Media for their work with Turners in the Best Strategic Thinking and Retail/Etail categories. The executive judges said “WE LOVE TINA! This campaign was a brilliant case study which was effective in its delivery and had a clear strategy showcasing simplicity at its finest. It was a pleasant surprise and one that had our Executive Judges saying, “why didn’t I think of this?””.

Special picked up two bronze and one silver Effie for their work with Motor Neurone New Zealand, but it was their campaign for Contact Energy, “It's Good To Be Home: Creating the foundations to get Contact back to growth” that nabbed them a Gold in the consumer services category along with a bronze in Best Strategic thinking. “This entry showed the power of brand. It’s emotive and taps into their core consumer insight and differentiates them from others who are shorting retail messages. Their ROI was also quite impressive, awesome work by the Contact Energy and Special duo” said this year’s Executive Judges.

DDB Aotearoa had a fantastic evening picking up 8 Bronze, 3 Silver, and 2 Gold’s along with two of the big awards for the evening. Their work for clients Pet Refuge, Lion Brewery, Coca-Cola, Samsung, and McDonald’s were all awarded but the standouts were a Gold in Sustained Success for Lotto-Imagine and a bronze, two silvers a gold, and a hardest challenge for their campaign “Sperm Positive” for Body Positive, Positive Women, and the Burnett Foundation.

YoungShand also picked up a Gold in Charity/Non for profit and a silver in Best Strategic Thinking for their work with New Zealand Blood Service, Unseen Emergencies.

TBWA\ picked up a bronze for their “The Everything Project” with Southern Cross and a bronze and a silver for their campaign with ANZ “How putting Kiwis' financial wellbeing first led to ANZ's most profitable brand campaign ever”. PHD also picked up a bronze Effie with ANZ for their work on “the socially distanced daffodil day” and a silver in PR/Experiential for their KFC campaign “Smashing it out of the park for KFC”.

But it was Colenso BBDO’s big night as they took home 8 awards, 4 Silver Effie’s for their work with State – The State Mistake Report, A bronze and a silver for their work with Spark on Beyond Binary Code, and a Gold in Sustained Success and the coveted Grand Effie® for their Skinny campaign “Get the Skinny”. Their client, Ally Young, from Spark/Skinny also picked up the Effective Marketer of the Year Award. The judges said of Ally, “She has the ability to rally everyone around a cause. To ensure the agencies are given a great brief, that ideas are protected, and the resulting work is on point. She understands the power of brand building, and the importance of brand codes.”

Other agencies awarded throughout the evening were EightyOne with Women’s Refuge, FCB/SIX with Mercury Movers, Māia and Ngāti Kuri, Strategy Creative and Great South, and VMLY&R with ACC.

The Commercial Communications Council congratulates all the finalists and winners at the 2022 Effie Awards in association with TVNZ. For a full list of winners and finalists please head to the Comms Council website.

The 2022 Aotearoa Effie Awards were proudly presented by the Commercial Communications Council (Comms Council) in association with TVNZ, its Commercial Partner. Comms Council also thanks Commercial Partner oOh!media and sponsors: Nielsen, NZME, The Radio Bureau, Meta, Google, Cartology, Neuro-Insight, NZ Story, and Stuff.